1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device for blocking stairs. More particularly it relates to a device which covers the first few lower stairs to block access to the stairway.
2. The Prior Art
Frequently, households with small children employ safety barriers to restrict them from certain parts of the house. The most common examples of such barriers are playpens and gates. Although a gate may be readily set up within a doorway, it is much more difficult to barricade other passageways, for instance, steps.
Steps are difficult to barricade because of the lack of the opposed planar surfaces which are needed to support conventional child gates. Certain prior art attempts to provide a safety guard for steps is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,225,863 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,372,772. Although these patents may effectively barricade the steps of a ladder, they do not specifically address the problem of barricading steps of a stairway. Accordingly it would be desirable to provide a device for blocking stairs which can be easily secured to any stairway.